By Myles Palmer
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WE HAVE struggled for a year to explain the Rooney phenomenon.
Is he the new Gazza?
The Chinese think he is the new Beckham.
Two days ago I thought Rooney was our Eminem.
The answer was staring me in the face, but I was too dim to ask the right question until I asked : what was the last outburst of raw working class talent?
The Gallagher brothers from Manchester, belligerent prole genius at its best !
Wayne Rooney is the new Oasis.
But Roonaldo won’t get his bodyguard to beat up the paparazzi and won’t mouth off about Blur.
Manchester only has the Stone Roses and Ruud van Nistelrooy.
Merseyside has four European Cups and the Beatles and Rooney, so just Slip inside the eye of your mind/ Don’t you know you might find/A better place to play/You said that you’d never been/But all the things that you’ve seen/
Will slowly fade away.
WHEN WILL England start playing like the Czech Republic played in coming back from 2-0 down to beat Holland 3-2 ?
It was a match of 35 shots and one suicidal substitution.
The Dutch team froze when Dick Advocaat took off his best player, left winger Robben, and put on clapped-out Man City midfielder Paul Bosvelt to mark Pavel Nedved.
Every Dutch player’s face said : What the f*** ? What does he think he is doing?
Edgar Davids was having a blinder, so he was sent out to the left wing !
Davids was taken off at half-time in the Germany game, partly because Ballack playing in a roaming forward role had baffled the Dutch.
Now Davids came back and played a storming game, as only he can.He was making a statement
And after that the Dutch team froze in confusion for a spell and the Czechs had the ball for the next five minutes.
Holland were winning 2-1, but then Nedved then took the game over.
Within ten minutes he had crossed, Koller chested down, Baros made it 2-2.
Heitinga was very, very unlucky to be sent off for running into the back of Nedved, who slowed down deliberately.
Nedved was now in dribbling dynamo mode, his bandy legs pumping like pistons, and he hit a rocket shot against the bar and saw Baros head the rebound over and then Smicer got the winner in 87.
A fantastic 90-minute performance by a Czech team which had created a great chance in the first minute when Rosicky chipped the ball through for Koller, who volleyed wide.
FOR ADVOCAAT, the Trap of the Day award for doing what was totally the wrong thing to do : conceding the momentum in the game.
On Friday, Italy had everything you want from them : power, movement, good flank play, shots, headers, stylish blue shirts.
But Trap bottled it by taking off Del Piero, Cassano and, incredibly, Gattuso.
There is no circumstance in which you take Gattuso off. If you are protecting a lead, keep him on.
If you are level and trying to win, keep him on.
If you are losing and chasing the game, he is the No.1 warrior and ball-winner and pro-active competitor.
Gattuso is a one-man team !
He is like Zidane, like Emerson of Roma, like Van Bommel on a good night
AGAINST LATVIA, RUDI VOLLER should have played Ballack in the same free role, not in the middle of a 4-4-2.
If Ballack is in midfield, only the back four can pass to him.
If he is roaming free behind the striker, everybody can pass to him.
For once,coach Skibbe got it wrong and Latvia drew 0-0 with the mighty Germans.
ENGLAND v CROATIA ?
Sven is a sun-loving playboy, a gambler.
He is gambling on Owen and Scholes.
He is gambling on his flat midfield four.
He is taking huge risks, but it’s his head on the block.
As I said the other day, we still don’t know if England are any good.
Sven has looked at Euro 2004 and said: I could play three games or four games or five games or six games. If I keep winning the press are irrelevant. If I lose, their opinions are important, but if I keep winning it will annoy them because they will have no story, no status, no reason to exist, nothing to whinge about.
Talking of moaners, did you hear the Barry Davies commentary on BBC1 tonight, on Portugal 1 Spain 0 ?
Hansen, Lineker, Schmeichel and Strachan all picked Spain, but I had a bet on Portugal because Spain had picked four new players, Juanito at centreback, Xabi Alonso in midfield, Joaquin at right wing and Torres at centre forward.
Four changes is too many.
And Spain only needed a draw. So I fancied a tight game and a 1-0 win for Portugal.
First half, Portugal were tactically brilliant, playing positive, risky football, but Pauleta was powderpuff and Cristiano Ronaldo missed an easy header.
Big Phil replaced Pauleta at half-time, bringing on Nuno Gomes, a stronger boy and he turned on a Figo nudged pass and blasted a shot through Juaninto’s legs and into the bottom corner.
Quick turn outside the D, smashed a fast shot which bounced and beat the dive of Casillas and finally shut up the moaning, whingeing, judgemental Barry Davies.
I rarely talk or write about commentators.
I just ignore them. I love Martin Tyler and I ignore all the others.
But Barry is the worst.
He has always been the same : a moaning, moaning, moaning, negative, know-all critic with an agenda, which he prefers to the match he is watching.
I can remember England touring South America 25 years ago and Barry was telling us where Ray Wilkins should have passed the ball.
And I’m pretty sure he missed the Hand of God incident.I don’t think he saw Maradona’s handball.
My memory isn’t anything to boast about, but I do remember things like that.
I still have a video of that game, one half with ITV commentary, one half with the BBC commentary. But have never watched it.
WHAT ABOUT BECKHAM v Croatia ?
Well, the boy is very laidback.
He is a nice guy and an introvert and a dreamer.
We know that Sven pampers him, they ring each other every day during the season.
But maybe Becks needs somebody to wind him up.
Maybe he has lacked fire since Fergie went out of his life.
OWEN and SCHOLES both need a goal.
Basically, we are unbalanced.
We need a Dunga or a Costinha in the anchor role.
Without that, nobody dares to go on a run.
Lampard and Gerrard can’t go on a run because neither knows whether, at that moment, he should be holding. Scholes ditto.
So Sven has three players who want to go on a run who can’t go on a run because nobody knows who should be holding.
We have seen that Trap, Advocaat and Santini are bad managers.
It’s the new UEFA rule.
Good teams must have bad managers, and less talented teams, like England, Portugal and Greece, must have good managers.
Is Sven a good manager?
If he beats Croatia, yes.
WHEN WILL England start playing like the Czech Republic?
When they have Rooney, Bobby Charlton, Peter Osgood, Alan Hudson and Gazza playing together.
Sven’s midfield is like having Alan Mullery, Johnny Hollins, Howard Kendall and Colin Harvey – it’s really four halfbacks, not four inside forwards, as he fondly imagines.
I’ve always said that the best thing you can do for a good footballer is to give him other good footballers to play with.
Will four halfbacks work for Sven this time?
20th June 2004.